


Telling

by VioletThePorama



Series: Lucky Duck [2]
Category: DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Discussion of Louie's luck, Friendship, Gen, Lena and Louie interact, Light Angst, Louie inherits Gladstone's luck, The way luck works is somewhat based off of ModMad's comics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2020-01-18
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:21:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21982837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VioletThePorama/pseuds/VioletThePorama
Summary: Louie has to work his way through the hard part of being lucky-telling his hardworking and 'luck-hating' family that he is.
Relationships: Lena (Disney: DuckTales) & Webby Vanderquack, Louie Duck & Lena (Disney: DuckTales)
Series: Lucky Duck [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1582435
Comments: 11
Kudos: 192





	1. A Witch and A Hex

“You want me to do  _ what _ , again?” Lena asked, and Louie shrugged, because he hadn’t found it all that complicated. 

“Detect magic or something? Isn’t that a spell?”

“In  _ DND _ . And I thought Huey was the nerd,” The teen snarked.

“Takes one to know one,” Louie smirked. 

Lena rolled her eyes and took a seat on the edge of the bed of the spare room. “So you want me to see if there’s magic on something?”

“On me, specifically,” Louie added. Lena glanced him over before taking a glance at her phone. “And maybe identifying what type of magic…”

“Does this have to do with your freak out at the movies yesterday?” She asked, and Louie hated that she was being so observant. Though it probably hadn’t been that hard to figure out. He  _ was _ approaching the teenage witch just a day later. 

Louie had yet to talk to anybody other than Uncle Donald and Uncle Gladstone about his luck, but he’d seen his mom talking to Donald and Mrs. Beakley all day, so he knew that another talk was imminent. Plus, he and his brothers had promised each other that there would be no more secrets between the three of them, so he could only avoid talking about it for so long. Hence why he wanted to go ahead and prove it once and for all. 

“Yeah, I’m lucky,” The duckling said. At Lena’s expression, he pressed on. “Like supernaturally lucky. My uncle is too, so I think it runs in the family or something.”

“Or something,” Lena mused, looking a bit more interested than she had before. “A lot of things seem to run in your family.”

“So you’ll do it?” Louie asked, trying not to sound as desperate as he felt. 

“Oh, I can’t detect magic,” She replied, offering him a grin. “But I know something that can…”

________________________________

A few moments later, after Lena had snatched some books out of Webby’s room while Louie kept watch, they returned to the empty wing of the manor that they had been hiding out in. Louie was careful not to mention how the teen turned all of the surrounding lights on before they settled back down. Instead, he sat down and focused on Lena as she opened one of the books on the floor. 

“So that’ll help?” Louie asked, and she nodded idly, flipping through the pages. 

“Stand back,” Was all Lena offered before she set down a smooth stone and murmured a chant under her breath. Her voice came out echoey, and Louie couldn’t make out most of the words. He sat back as she had suggested, and watched on as her eyes began to glow. The light emanating from the rock caught his attention, as it was enveloped in the same color glow as her eyes. After a moment, the light left her gaze, and Lena sat back looking worn out. The rock pulsed gently with bursts of color. 

“So…” Louie asked after Lena looked around the room. “Do you detect anything?”

“Tons of stuff, yeah,” Lena breathed, sitting back and turning the rock over in her hands. “There’s a lot of stuff all over the place, but I can’t make out anything specific here… Other than a cursed book in that cabinet.” 

Louie looked at the cabinet and the multitude of books in it. They all looked like political books, but one could never be sure in the McDuck Manor. 

“You guys have a  _ lot _ of dangerous stuff in here,” She went on. “Do you have a way to use your luck? Maybe that would set something off and I’d be able to see it.”

“Not really?” The green-clad duckling replied. He was vaguely sure that whatever luck he had was always pouring off of him, but he had no idea how to use it without a lottery ticket or an arcade game.

Louie stood up and glanced around the room, looking for a way to prove it. His gaze fell on a lamp, off in the corner of the room.

That could work. But first…

“Hey, that lamp isn’t cursed or anything, is it?”

________________________________

“I really don’t think this is a good idea,” Lena remarked, watching Louie stand on a dresser with the lamp. “I’m the oldest one in here, remember? If that breaks,  _ I _ ’ _ ll _ be the one in trouble.”

“Relax,” Louie soothed, trying to exude as much confidence as he could. He  _ needed _ Lena to trust him. Louie wasn’t as close to her as Webby was, but she was fun enough, and he wasn’t going to purposefully get either of them in trouble. “Nothing’s going to break. I’m lucky, remember?”

“The jury’s still out on that,” The girl huffed, crossing her arms and leaning against the bed. The rock continued to pulse with faint light off to her side. Louie was reminded for a moment that she was a bit older than him. 

Lena gave a huff of amusement as he positioned the lamp. Maybe not  _ that _ much older.

He turned his attention to the lamp. Standing up on the desk like he was, Louie was standing up high enough to break it. Hopefully, his luck would kick in and stop that from happening so that Lena could sense it. And also so they wouldn’t get in trouble. 

Louie let go of the lamp and stepped back in surprise as his elbow bumped against the old bookshelf and knocked off one of the books. The book, luckily not the cursed one, fell into some throw pillows that he and Lena had moved away from the bed and stacked in a pile. The pillows fell into a clumped pile underneath the lamp just before it hit the ground.

The lamp was undamaged.

“How’s that?” Louie asked smugly, and glanced over to see Lena clutching the rock in one hand and staring hard at him. “Uh… Lena?”

“I’m- yeah. Sorry. There’s magic.”

Well that was good to know, but the teen still looked shaken. Louie hopped off the desk and put the lamp back in the corner before he went to sit on the bed next to where she stood. When Lena tensed, he stepped back. 

“Is everything okay?” The duckling asked, testing the waters. Her fingers tightened around the rock, and she gave him a strained smile. 

“It’s fine, I just don’t know why I didn’t see it there before… There’s a  _ lot _ of magic radiating off of you. It’s not like  _ Her _ magic or anything so I don’t know why I’m-” Lena took a breath, and Louie backed away further and took a seat in a chair across the room. Then he spread his hands to show that he didn’t have anything. She shook her head in response. “You’re fine. It’s more like… An artifact, than actual magic.”

“What do you mean?” Louie asked carefully. He didn’t want to upset Lena any further and Webby would probably kill him if she figured out that Louie had freaked Lena out at  _ all _ , but being ‘like an artifact’ didn’t sound all that promising. 

“It isn’t magic that you got somehow, it’s more like… Something that’s just  _ there _ . Like how certain gems or ingredients have properties. It’s pouring off of you, and it’s still there like-” Lena hesitated before recognition flashed across her face. “It’s a hex, I think. It isn’t fresh, and it doesn’t even look like something you could’ve gotten from this lifetime.”

“So wait, I was reincarnated with this or something?” Louie asked, grasping at straws. 

“No, no. I’m explaining this so badly… You said your uncle is lucky too, right? I think it’s hereditary or something. This is a really old hex, if it is one. It’s just there. It’s less prominent now but it spiked when you dropped the lamp, so…”

“So I’m cursed.”

“ _ Hexed _ .”

Louie sat back in the chair. “Right. Well...”

“Yeah. Sorry I can’t be of more help.”

“You did fine,” Louie told her earnestly. “Do you want me to text Webby to come get you?”

Lena ducked her head, and the rock stopped pulsing with magic. “Yeah, that might be best.”

He did so, and they waited around for a bit before Lena got up, murmuring that Webby was down the hall. Louie went to get up and stay a distance from her, but the teen shook her head and offered him a smile, much more confident than the one she had given him earlier. 

“I’m alright,” Lena told him. “... Good luck with your mom.”

“Thanks, Lena.”

She hesitated by the door, looking at him. “Do you want me to tell Webby for you?”

“... No, I’ve got it.”

“... Alright.”


	2. Friends and Family

The next step was telling his siblings, Webby, and her immediate friends. Louie gathered the lot of them into one of the halls that they usually played with Webby in, and leaned back against the wall as they all crowded around in front of him.

Huey sat next to Dewey, who was of course, still milking the broken ankle angle, and was lounged back on some cushions off to the side. Webby sat on the other side of Huey, murmuring at Violet, who watched him impassively. When his gaze landed on Lena, she gave him an encouraging smile before the teen turned back to watching Webby and Violet. 

Once everybody was situated and giving him expectant looks, Louie stood up straight and delivered the sentence that he’d been thinking over since he and Lena had departed earlier. “I inherited Uncle Gladstone’s luck.”

“You did?” Dewey asked, amongst the other exclamations of excitement and confusion. To his surprise, there was very little denial. None at all, in fact. “Is this about those tickets last night?”

“It kind of is,” Louie slipped his hands into his pockets, ignoring the worried look Huey shot him. “But the reason I got those tickets is because I’m lucky now.”

“He is,” Lena confirmed. “He asked me to check him for magic, and there’s a lot of it pouring off of him.”

Violet and Webby glanced at Lena before grinning at him. Webby gave him a thumbs up, and Louie was blown away by how accepting they all were of it.

“Really?” Huey mused. “How did you figure it out?”

“I won every prize at Funso’s arcade,” Louie couldn’t help but brag. That hadn’t been all, of course, but he wasn’t going to divulge just how much crying he had been doing to any of them. 

“Woah!” Dewey and Webby exclaimed. Louie smirked as Dewey went on. “That is  _ so _ cool! We should all go there when my ankles better!”

“Yeah!” Webby squealed.

“When we go, we can help you figure out how to control it,” Huey offered, opening up his Mr. Woodchucks Guidebook and flipping through some of the pages, though Louie doubted that there was anything in it for such a situation. 

“I don’t really think it’s a type of magic I can control that easily,” Louie responded, glancing at Lena both to check this, and to avoid what was surely going to be a disappointed gaze from his brother. After Lena gave him a nod, Louie glanced back down, only to look up again when Huey put a hand on his shoulder. 

“We can at least figure out what sets it off,” Huey told him. “It doesn’t have to be something that you control.”

“And I can check the library for anything having to do with luck,” Violet went on. “Just in case.”

“ _ Oh _ ,” Louie mumbled, glancing around at all of them. They were all so… calm about it. He had expected more shouting, maybe more arguing, and definitely more denial. Instead of any of those, he was offered the prospect of having  _ fun _ and learning how to use his luck. 

Sure, Uncle Donald was offering that too, in a way, but it was different to have other people his age excited over it when he had been so very sure that they were going to be mad. 

“Alright,” Louie agreed, suddenly looking forward to the prospective trip to Funso’s that Dewey was chattering about from his cushions.

Webby ran over to his other side, hugging his arm. “Wait a minute! Is this why you’ve been so distant? Well, no worries. No luck vampires will get to you on our watch!”

“Thanks, Webby,” Louie mumbled, moving to hug her back. He didn’t look at his siblings or friends again, but he  _ knew _ that they were all grinning. 


	3. The Miser

“I’m not mad at you,” Della had told him, right after calling Louie away from the dinner table into another room to talk. Uncle Donald stood behind her, quietly observing. His mom’s words sounded quoted, or at least horribly similar to something he’d heard from Donald and Mrs. B. before. 

Not that it wasn’t comforting to know.

“I just wanted to talk to you about your luck, alright?” His mom went on. Louie shrugged and slipped his hands into his pockets before looking at her face. Then Della continued. “Are you alright with talking about it right now?”

“I’m fine,” The duckling responded, gaze dipping down to her chin rather than meeting her eyes. She let out a short huff before nodding. 

“Donald explained some of it to me. I’m not upset for what happened at the movies, but we need to lay down some rules for the future,” Della paused briefly, looking him over. “You can’t run off like that again, understand? I know you have your luck now, and it can take care of you, but that was still  _ dangerous _ .”

“But we go on dangerous adventures all the time,” Louie interjected. 

“That’s out  _ there _ . You always have somebody around for you on adventures-” Della scrambled to find the right words, and waved off Donald when he stepped closer as if to help her. “I’ve got it- just… This is a big city. People get caught up in feeling safe and secure, and things  _ happen _ to them. It isn’t like a curse on an adventure, it’s people with intentions. Going out right now is still the same as it’s always been. You still have to stay with us or tell us where you’re going, even if you’re somehow luckier than Gladstone.”

Louie slouched in his seat and nodded. 

“Alright, next. I understand-,” She glanced pointedly at Donald “-That you didn’t mean to get those tickets, and that you weren’t necessarily planning on using them, but just because you  _ got _ them doesn’t mean that we were obliged to see the movie they were for. If you get something that we’ve already discussed, like more desert or tickets, the decision me or another adult decided on still stands.”

“And there will still be consequences for doing things against our rules,” Donald clarified.

Della hummed her agreement and then looked back at Louie. “Any questions? Comments?”

Louie thought it over. The terms were about what he had expected. He was still to rely on his usual schemes rather than his luck to get around things.  _ Not _ that he wasn’t going to use it to his advantage at some point in the future, but he at least would know that the consequences were still the same. 

“No, that about sums it up,” Louie told them.

Della looked relieved. “Good. We can call Gladstone later and talk to him about how you can get a better handle on controlling it-”

“I can’t,” Louie interrupted quickly, sitting up a bit.

Both his mom and his uncle looked at him with varying levels of concern.

“What do you mean?” Della asked after a moment. 

“I can’t control it. It just  _ happens _ ,” Louie told them, as he had his siblings and friends. The statement came out sounding rather more defeated than he had meant for it to. 

Della watched him for a while before reaching out and taking his hand. “We’ll call him anyway.”

“You don’t believe me?” Louie snapped, pulling away.

“I do,” His mom reassured quickly. “I just want to make sure, because that sounds a bit different from what I remember of his luck.”

Louie shrugged and looked at Uncle Donald when he spoke up. “Have you told the others yet?”

“Yeah. I told them,” Louie nodded. It had been a lot easier, telling all of them. They had been so understanding about everything… Not like…

“What about Scrooge?” Uncle Donald continued. 

Louie paused. He had avoided talking to his adventuring uncle about it ever since he’d first began suspecting that he was lucky, knowing that Scrooge hated anything other than hard work. 

“I didn’t think so,” Uncle Donald croaked with a sigh.

“We can help you tell him,” Della suggested, and Louie nodded.

Then, they walked to his study. Uncle Scrooge had been skipping dinner the last few nights to eat in his study and better focus on whatever finances his last meeting had left him stressing over, but when Louie had voiced his concern over Scrooge being too busy to see them, he was waved off. 

“He’ll see us,” Donald declared with a frown, and after some knocking and insisting that they needed to talk, Uncle Scrooge did just that. 

The interior of the office was rather dimly lit, and Louie couldn’t help but stray closer to his mom as they walked in. He had been in his uncle’s study plenty of times before, but this time, he had no plan, and no way to voice what was going on while still having the upper hand. 

“What do you want?” Uncle Scrooge asked Donald, after he greeted each of them.

“Louie has something he needs to tell you,” Della said, which unfortunately brought the misers attention over to him. 

“And what might that be?”

“I’m lucky,” Louie declared quickly, for what felt like the thousandth time. “Like,  _ Uncle Gladstone _ lucky.”

There was a short pause, and then a scoff from Uncle Scrooge, though he didn’t say anything else about it for a long moment. Then, rather than remarking on how he didn’t believe in luck or something of the sort, Scrooge asked something that Louie hadn’t expected. “You’ve tested your luck, I take it?”

Louie stared at him, so his mom jumped in, describing how there had been specific instances that had clued her into it. Then Uncle Donald went on to explain that Gladstone had been there, and had backed up Louie’s claims. Louie tuned out some as the siblings went back and forth describing the previous night with the movie tickets and Louie’s distress. 

Scrooges face went from a grimace to something more thoughtful, and when his gaze finally landed on Louie, he looked fond. “And have you tested it  _ yourself _ , laddie?”

“I have,” Louie told him. “Other than the stuff with Gladstone. I asked Lena to see if she could detect magic on me.”

“And what did she say, exactly?”

“She said there was a lot, but it looked more like a hex than actual wizardry or sorcery or… whatever.”

Uncle Scrooge sat back, drumming his fingers on his desk as he thought. “A hex?”

“She also said it looked hereditary,” Louie offered. 

“Gladstone is only distantly related to you,” Donald huffed.

Della elbowed him. “But he got it from his mom, didn’t he? It’s close  _ enough _ .”

“It’s plausible,” Scrooge agreed. “I’ll need to talk to some people about it later, but if it’s a  _ hex _ , it could be curable-”

Louie blanched, though it went unnoticed by the rest of the rooms occupants. 

“-I have a few contacts I could speak to about lifting it…” 

“I don’t want it  _ cured _ ,” Louie snapped, and his eyes found the ground as the adults all turned to look at him.

“But lad-”

“I  _ don’t _ want it cured! It’s  _ my _ luck. I don’t care if it’s a hex or whatever. Maybe- maybe I’ll want it gone later, but it’s not something that needs to be fixed!” Louie balled his hands into fists and curled in on himself. “I’m not something that needs fixing.”

After a long, tense moment, he looked up, meeting Uncle Scrooge’s startled and apologetic gaze.

“You don’t have ta’ get rid of anything,” His uncle promised as the duckling looked away again. “I didn’t mean for you ta’ get upset, Louie. I shouldn’t have said that.”

Louie nodded, and wiped his sleeve against his eyes. “I… Okay. Can I go eat now?”

Uncle Scrooge nodded, and his mom ruffled his feathers. Uncle Donald bent down and gave him a reassuring smile and a hug before sending him on his way to eat dinner. 

The adults stayed behind and talked, but Louie wasn’t too worried about it. He had gotten the hardest thing out of the way, after all. 

**Author's Note:**

> I based some of how Louie's magic works on how Gladstone's luck in ModMad's comics works. Mostly I based it off of the 2017 version, with a hint of the old Ducktales.


End file.
